Rowell’s ‘Landline’ a paranormal romantic comedy

Thursday

Aug 7, 2014 at 5:11 PMAug 8, 2014 at 12:44 PM

Rainbow Rowell's "Landline" is a light, paranormal rom-com of a book.

By C. A. Bridgeschris.bridges@news-jrnl.com

If you picked up the phone and found yourself talking to someone 25 years in the past, what would you say?Especially if what you say now might change what happened then?In Rainbow Rowell’s new book “Landline,” Georgie McCool’s marriage is showing signs of wear. She’s working nonstop as a writer for a successful if banal TV show which leaves her barely any time for her husband Neal or their two daughters. But when she gets a life-changing opportunity to create her own show with her longtime co-writer and best friend Seth, she has to go for it even though it means a long week of work.Only that week is Christmas, and an exasperated Neal takes the kids off to see their grandma, as planned, leaving her alone to work and worry about her marriage. Thanks to a faulty cellphone battery she can’t keep in touch, and increasing stress drives her to her own mother’s house where she tries calling him on the old dial phone in her old room. He answers, but it’s not the Neal who left her in 2013. It’s the Neal who left her for a week back in 1988, before driving back to propose to her on Christmas Day. And now that may or may not happen, depending on what she says next...It is not a slight to say this is the lightest of Rowell’s books so far. It has the charming conversational back-and-forths and the witty observations on daily life she used to such great effect in “Attachments,’ Eleanor and Park” and Fangirl.” But it doesn’t quite have the heft of her other works. The secondary characters aren’t quite as filled out, their storylines aren’t particularly important to the book. Georgie herself doesn’t change very much. Most of what happens you can see coming, in fact. And yet I read it in one long gulp, because even though I was sure how it ended -- and I was right -- I wanted to see what they said to get there. Present-day Georgie and 1988-Neal have a great, flirtatious rapport, better than any of the other connections in the book, and it’s fun to read.What “Landline” really is, I think, is a romantic comedy movie script with better description. This could easily be adapted for the big screen and in some ways might be better for it. But for now “Landline” makes a fine summer read. Throw it in your beach bag and think about what you’d say to your husband 25 years ago.“Landline,” by Rainbow Rowell. St. Martin’s Press, 320 pages. Hardcover $24.99, ebook $10.99, audiobook (read by Rebecca Lowman) $20.99.